I'm Alive!
by Tazz Dieudonne
Summary: "I got low so I put a bullet in my mouth and the other guy spit it out!" Bruce Banner thinks about his past suicide attempts.


I went a little psycho last nigh and this is the product. Warning- t's kinda depressing. The whole story was inspired by the song 'I'm Alive' by Shinedown. The bold is bits of conversation between Tony and Bruce. The italics are bits of Bruce's past. Reviews feed the starving writer.

I'm alive I'm alive

when your dead in side

I'm your wake up call

and you know I'm right

make a move

let it bleed

Tare your heart off your sleeve

but i'm the only one who's

gonna save your life

SET ME FREE!

"I**n case you needed to kill me, but you can't I know I've tried... I got low, I didn't see an end so I put a bullet in my mouth and the other guy spit it out!" **

_Bruce Banner stared at the gun in his hands. He had bought it out of desperation. There was only one person left he wanted to kill. He had killed so many already. If he was to end his life now how many others would he be saving? How many people would not have to weep for a dead loved one? How many homes would not be wrecked? How many body's would remain whole because of his death?_

"**Why?" Tony asked the question he had wanted to ask sense Bruce said those words. **

"**Why." Bruce gave a fake laugh. "You really don't know do you."**

"**Enlighten me."**

_ The small gun weight a ton in his hand. Could he pull the trigger? Bruce sat alone in the hotel room contemplating the end. He would go quietly. He would do it in the bath room so it was easier to clean up the mess afterwords. The owners would have quite the shock when they came knocking. But wasn't it better to have the shock then have their lives destroyed? They maybe scarred forever. What if the little girl came in first? Could he really do that to a child? _

"**Are you thinking of jumping?" Tony came up behind him.**

"**No"**

_ Yes Bruce decided. He thought of the girls body broken, her eyes lifeless like so many he had seen. It was much better this way. He should have done this a long time ago. After the first incident. All the lives he would have saved. He put the gun in his mouth. Bruce screwed up his eyes anticipating the pain. He pulled the trigger. _

"**It wasn't a heroic act. I did it as much for those people as I did for myself." Bruce admitted. **

"**But you could have done so much more with your life. Why?" The words 'giving up' were not in Tony Starks vocabulary.**

"**I could have killed so many more people. I **_**did**_** kill so many more people."**

_ Bruce awoke. Naked in a destroyed building. It was a familiar seen. All to familiar. How many dead? How much damage was done? Getting up he saw the very seen he had sought to prevent. The bullet had not ended his life, only those around him. The little girl from the lobby. She had so kindly showed him his room. She smiled when he thanked her. Her eyes use to shine with such brightness, such life. Use to. There she lay next to him. He made himself look._

"**She was just a child, Tony how do you not see the pain I've gone through?"**

"**You just wanted an escape." Tony whispered taking the words from his mouth.**

"**My best intentions turned in to disaster."**

_ Bruce had seen death before. This was the worst. Her body was crumpled. She looked like a rag doll left behind by its owner. Her bottom half was crushed and trapped by a fallen roof beam. Her head and arms hung in the air. Her soft hair was the only thing moving, blown by the wind. One of her arms was bent at an angle. Had she still been alive when the beam fell and crushed her? Had she writhed in pain calling for help? No! He couldn't think about that._

"**That's when I started going to the funerals."**

"**Why?" Tony felt sick. **

"**I wanted to punish myself I suppose." Bruce shrugged.**

_ It was the first funeral he attend. He didn't even hide. He stud in the open. He watched as her mother cried on her fathers shoulder. The two brothers stud in shocked silence. All her friends wept. What had it been like to get the call? What had it been like to see the damage?_

"**No one saw me. I wanted to say to them. 'Look here I am. I killed her'." Bruce took off his glasses and wiped at the tears. Tony put a comforting hand around his shoulder. "I went because I wanted to look every person in the eye. I needed to see the pain there and know what I had done to these people. There were so many. I went from city to city fleeing from every thing. Trying to escape the destruction, and he pile of corpses, I left behind. That's when I first tried to find a way out."**

_ He half hoped that some one would recognize him. Someone would curse at him. Unleash all their... anger. Their anger didn't have as devastating consequences. Bruce stud and watched. He saw the look in every persons face. He looked them straight in the eye. Some stared back at him pleading with their eyes for some one to rescue them from the pain. Others turned away quickly ashamed at their tears. They all told the same tale. That is when Bruce realized that it was not the one who had die he should feel sorry for but the loved ones they left behind to morn them. _

"**What would she look like if she was still alive? I severed a thread of life, no better or worse than any other, and I just kept cutting away."**

"**It wasn't you Bruce. It was him."**

"**What's the difference at this point."**

_ Experiments. he had always loved looking at a problem and solving it through trial and error. This is how Bruce approached his death. Bullets didn't work. But that wasn't enough data to make a conclusion. He needed to try other methods. For three long weeks he experimented in a deserted area of africa. Nothing did any good. _

"**They looked like they had just been slapped without any warning. Imagine calling up your friend or you sibling to go hang out. They don't pick up and when you get home the police and their dead corpse are sitting there. You have no idea how many people have suffered because of me. Not just the ones I killed or maimed. The families I tore up. They all had people who cared about them. People whose lives were suddenly ripped apart. That's why."**

_ The other guy tore apart every noose. Pills had no effect. Alcohol never did any thing. If Bruce jumped he never hit the ground the other guy caught him. The other guy would come out to play before Bruce bleed to death. If he was drowning Bruce suddenly found himself safe and dry again, although everything in the area was crushed. Drug over dose was a failure. suffocation in any way, shape, or form ended in disaster. He tried every last way but always he woke up unscathed every single time. _

"**life had no meaning left." Tony felt pity for the man who sat in front of him now. He had given up on life so long ago but he couldn't die. "I've tried everything." Bruce buried his head in his hands.**

_No matter how hard he tried no matter how much he planed people just kept getting hurt. Bruce knew the worth of life because he had lived for to long. He would wander around aimlessly but he couldn't escape. Every were he when images of the destruction haunted him. How can one live a life when he is constantly thinking of how wrong every thing could go. A tight rope walker who longed to jump from his perch but his feet were stuck. All he could do was walk ever so slowly and carefully waiting for the next time he would destroy again. Like stepping through a mind field waiting for the world to explode. That is no life at all. _

**There was only one thing Tony could say.**

"**You haven't tried living."**


End file.
